I Can't Watch the Raindrops
by TheBreakfastGenie
Summary: Abby deals with losing Kate over time. Kabby, but it's not too blatant until the end. Rating changed to K . Based on a song/poem of mine.


AN: This is based on a song/poem thing that pooped into my head and was inspired by Kate and Abby. I might post the original poem/song but right now it's not fully finished. The second paragraph is based on the refrain which is why it's kind of different. I'm not too happy with how that part turned out in the story but oh well.

Disclaimer: I do NOT own NCIS at all. I wish I could call some shots but alas I can't so I come here instead. Also, the character Justin is NOT based on ANY real or fictional artist. That was just his working name and then it felt weird to change it.

I Can't Watch the Raindrops

"Kate!" Abby spins around as she heard a soft female voice gently call out the name. It's so familiar, and the hear it, right behind her, in isle twenty-two of her usual grocery store... her eyes find a little girl, blonde hair pulled into pigtails not unlike her own, running to her mother with a yellow box of cereal in her hand. "Thank you, Katie," Caitlin's mother smiles at her and puts the cereal into their shopping cart. Tears start to fill Abby's eyes as she internally curses herself. She knows it's not an uncommon name. And then a wave a sadness and fear hits her as she watches the small family buying their groceries, and she realizes she's forgotten what it's like not to worry that tomorrow it could be one of yours as well as anyone else. She says a silent prayer for the little girl and her mother. _Never let her Kate follow mine. _Abby's face begins to ache but she won't let the tears fall, she waits for them to dry and continues through the store, trying not to wonder where the Kate and her mother are now.

Abby looks up at night and sees Kate's face. Sometimes Kate smiles and sometimes she haunts her. Abby can't think of anything else when she sees stars so she grows to love the clouds. But she hates rain. Right after Kate died it rained for a long time, but that's not all. It's also that Abby used to think raindrops were beautiful and something about them screams "Kate" to her. She can't watch them fall now because then she wants to cry and she can't cry anymore because she has to stay strong. She has to look away and try to pretend it's sunny, and God forbid she go outside. Sunshine is good. The sun was shining at Kate's funeral but she had comfort there and she knew it was a tribute. It was like being in the eye of the storm of pain, grief, and misery that had enveloped her since Kate's death. Storms again.

Abby was the last one to find out but she didn't have a chance to feel insulted. She was too busy being completely, utterly, devastated. They had all taken it hard, especially Tony who stared blankly at the walls of her lab for over an hour before Abby tearfully coaxed him into washing her blood off his face. Kate's blood. He just wasn't ready to let her go. He knew when he saw the red-tinged water he'd have to accept it, and he wasn't sure he could do that. But numbness was only comforting for so long, and seeing Abby, trying to hard to be strong for him, when she needed the support so much more, he managed to stand up. And, once it was done, he felt anger, which, in a twisted way, was soothing.

Abby felt she had cried long enough. It was time to stand up and be strong and do her part to catch the bastard that had done this. She couldn't bear to think of it as getting justice, because it wouldn't bring Kate back, it wouldn't be enough to make it just. She was so worried when the rest of the team went back out to look for him, but she pushed down her fears and held herself together. Then, in her lab, she could have sworn Kate was laughing at her when she tripped and knocked Bert off the table. Not unkindly, quite the opposite, the way friends laugh at themselves together. And then there was the tire mark, which, through all her misery, Abby nearly missed. She could swear Kate said "Abs, look at that." Some invisible force pointed her to it and she ended up with a clue.

Even weeks later, even when she was starting to do better, Abby walked through the NCIS building she loved and imagined Kate buying a snack from the vending machine. She wondered how their cases would be different if Kate were still there, no matter how hard she tried not to. It was impossible, really. Abby would always wonder.

Justin had always been a good friend to Abby. When he started a band last year Abby had been happy for him, but lately she hadn't been thinking about anyone in her life. She hears her phone ring and picks it up without looking at the caller ID. It's not like it matters anyway. "Hello?" she says dejectedly.

"Hey Abs. We're doing a concert in DC this weekend and I'd really like you to come,"

"I don't know..." she responds, uncertain.

"Come on Abby, please? It would mean a lot," he presses, and he doesn't mean it would mean a lot for him, he means it would mean a lot for her, to go outside somewhere instead of withering away.

"I guess..." she responds and hangs up, and he doesn't get insulted because he knows how hard things are for her right now. On Saturday he shows up at he apartment, a ticket in his hand. He won't say it because it will make her made and she'll start crying, but she needs to think about something else, if only for an hour. His band is the stadium they have booked, making sure everything his set up. Justin is going to drive Abby there himself. He lets her out at the entrance and goes backstage to get ready.

The concert is almost over and Justin hopes it helped thought he's not really sure. And he knows what he needs to do, he's had it prepared, he's just nervous, worried it will only serve to make everything worse. But it's all he can think of so he know he has to try. He announces there is one last song he'd like to sing, one he wrote very recently. As he's seeing he picks out a single tear-stained gothic face in the crowd and smiles. When it's over and he holds onto the microphone, and seeing that he wants to speak the stunned audience stays silent. He says, "This song is for the NCIS agent who died two weeks ago, in the line of duty. She's an angel now, for protecting what she believed in, and I sang this song for her, but also for my friend, who will never forget Caitlin Todd."

Abby feels silent tears streaming down her cheeks but she is touched by his sweet dedication. She can't believe he would do something that big for her. It feels good to care about something, even a little bit, again. It feels like living. But Abby still knows she hasn't moved on yet. Kate's loss still hits her like a ton of bricks several times a day.

Earlier that morning, Ziva had been by. To say they hadn't gotten along would be an understatement. Abby hadn't treated her well, she knew that. And part of her thought maybe she could like Ziva, but she just wasn't ready yet. It still hurt too much to have lost Kate. Abby didn't really mean to lash out like that, but she hadn't been able to help it. She knew Ziva was probably a perfectly nice woman who was only replacing Kate professionally, and she wasn't to blame for Kate being gone. Ziva didn't kill Kate, Ari did, and Abby knew that. She wished, for a second, that she could have met Ziva without losing Kate, because then she could be her friend right now. But it wasn't like that. By now, though, Abby was starting to reason again, and she knew someday she'd be over Kate and it wouldn't hurt quite so badly. As well as she knew that, though, she also knew that today wasn't someday, and she needed more time to work herself out. Maybe when that someday did happen Abby could explain everything. If Ziva understood they could still be friends then, but right now she was too exhausted and sad to try.

It's been two and a half years since Kate died and Abby is amazed at how well she's rebuilt her life. She was right about Ziva, and after a few months of enmity the two of them are close friends. There have been hard times but no one else has died and Abby is glad to have the team with her. She still thinks about Kate sometimes, and wonders what they would be doing know if she were alive. Whose apartment would they live in? Would they go on trips together? Would they have a cat or dog? She doesn't know and she feels sad about that but it doesn't hurt the way it used. She hasn't found anyone else yet but she knows when she's ready she will. It took a long time but Abby finally feels like she can love again if she finds someone. The team still talks about her too, though usually not when Ziva's around because Ziva didn't know Kate. Gibbs shows Abby the sketchbook Kate left behind and she smiles as she flips through the portraits and caricatures of all of them. Ziva could be a panther, she muses, like she was once a bat. It feels good to be alive and remember. She doesn't know when it happened but somewhere along the way her wounds healed into scars and she can live that.


End file.
